So some of you might’ve been expecting this post for a while, but we’re going on indefinite hiatus (which is a nice way of saying, “we’re probably closed for good, unless something extraordinary happens”). For the foreseeable future, there’s going to be no more Basement Stories.

This is for two reasons:

1. Obviously we cannot keep up with the submissions we’re getting, and it’s becoming painfully obvious that we’re doing our authors a disservice.

2. And, more significantly, there is (if you’ll excuse my language) no fucking way we can pay for this anymore. I don’t want to bore your with personal details or turn this into a space to whine about my own life, but it’s been tricky making rent and enough money for groceries, shelling out a couple hundred bucks per issue on stories is a luxury neither of us can afford. Weird as it sounds, I really do like paying authors. I kind of love sending off a check to someone whose work I admire, because I feel like it serves as a retroactive thank you for all of the stories they’ve given me that I’ve enjoyed so much. But I’m holding together my jeans with safety pins and hope, and oatmeal has become a prominent feature in my diet, so. I can’t.

This is probably the hardest post I’ve ever had to write – not just for Basement Stories, but just, for the entirety of my internet existence. I know that this magazine has been somewhat of a derelict rowboat, a kind of twopenny zine with not enough content or consistency or speediness, but it was fucking fun, I loved it, I loved it so so much, and I’m going to miss it. I liked making something that I knew would brighten people’s days, or make them think, and I liked making poets and writers and artists feel that momentary utter thrill of acceptance.

This sucks.

But thanks to all of our writers, all of our readers, all of you.  Thanks to everyone who’s been patient with us, the other editors who have given advice and words of encouragement, especially Casey Seda, who once single handedly saved my website. Thanks, man. All of my love, all of my thanks, to every single one of you.

Fuck, James, hand me a tissue.

Some of you should be hearing from us soon re: wrapping up some loose ends. The rest of you, who’ve submitted something or other, should be getting an email releasing your story from the bonds of our inbox, but if you’re reading this and you haven’t gotten that email yet, you can still consider your story ready to submit elsewhere.

Hopefully we’ll see you all again someday.

If you remember us for anything, remember this: we were the least professional semi-pro ‘zine to ever exist.

All the best from both of us,

Carol and James

And it’s beautiful.

Go. Look. Read.

Table of Contents

Poetry, nonfiction, and art will not be closed to submissions, so send away!

On the subject of fiction, for the past month or so I’ve had a hand in reading stories from our two new fiction readers – Maria Perales and Nichole Di Dio. They’ve been invaluable, and have been helping immensely in my efforts to get through the backlog of stories.

Nichole Di Dio loves the written word. She accepts it in all its forms: poetry, prose, play-scripts, outlines, shopping lists, scribbles in margins, spray paint on city streets, carved into trees, flashing across billboards and other sorts. To her, your word is your power, so always use it wisely.  In her free time, she enjoys spending time outside writing poetry, curious-georging (exploring) and/or diving into a new book or TV show.

Maria Perales is a twenty-something-year-old reader currently teaching English in South Korea, where she’s spent eleven months learning that she should have respected her teachers a whole lot more in middle school. She graduated from Duke University in 2010 with a degree in Literature, and has spent every waking moment since then wanting to go back. She likes humor, horror, and everything in between, and loves nothing so much as she loves books.

And, of course, Issue #4 comes out in 15 days. God help us all.

Fiction:

“TimeSnip” by Cat Rambo

“Sugarplum Karma” by Stephen Blount

“A Void Wrapped in a Smile” by Tim Pratt

Poetry:

“Dawn” by WC Roberts

“Remorse and the Pariah” by Michael DeLuca

“Birthing Monsters” by Siobhan Carroll

“Dreams After the Storm” by Eliza Victoria
Nonfiction:

“And All My Idols Are Angels, with the Faces of Cranky Old Men” by George Potter

So, we’re looking for a few slush readers – mostly to help read fiction (as we get about five or six times the amount of short stories as we do poetry).

This would, of course, be a volunteer position, unless we suddenly all become millionares. It’d take maybe five-ish hours of your time every week.

If you’d like to read for us, please send the following info to us at basementstoriesmag@gmail.com:

1. Your favorite story we’ve published (and why).

2. Your least favorite story we’ve published (and why).

3. Your top five science fiction/fantasy short stories (and, again, why they’re your favorites).

4. What kind of stories you like to read (time travel, sword and sorcery, alternate histories, etc.)

Basically, we’re just trying to figure if your tastes match up all right with our tastes.

Until we say otherwise, assume we’re still looking for readers.

Thanks for reading, everyone.

To be honest with you all, I felt bad about neglecting Basement Stories for so very long, very very bad, and there’s not a good enough excuse to explain the lack of communication from us these past two months.

There are probably two large contributing factors to why, slowly, we got behind on the slush, until it just became too overwhelming to deal with:

1. Money. Of course.

2.  Trying to, perhaps, take on too much at once, considering the size of our slush pile vs. the size and free time of the staff.

To remedy these problems, we might be looking at shifting payrates down to 1 cent a word soon (though that’s by no means certain, and for now we’ll continue to pay 3 cents a word, $30 for poetry), setting up some sort of regular fundraiser, or charging for epub/pdf versions of the issues.

We also might be looking to add on another slush reader/ general assistant editor in the near future.  Look for announcements concerning all of that soon.

But thank you, all of you, who have been patient with us over these months. I appreciate it, we appreciate it.

I forgot how good it can be, to make something that you love and are proud of, something other people can look at and enjoy. Sure, it’s not a profitable venture, or a particularly business-savvy one, but it is a work of love.  My mantra has been, since the first issue, a quote from George Potter’s story – “Doing what you love always pays you back.”

The commander of STS-134 is going to be Mark Kelly, a veteran astronaut and the husband of Sen. Gabrielle Giffords, one of the victims of the shooting in Arizona last month. Until yesterday, nobody was really sure if Kelly was going to continue training for STS-134 or if he was going to take an extended (completely and totally understandable) leave of absence.  I admire Kelly so much, for his continued dedication to his job despite the horrible turn his life has taken in the last month. He’s a brave man, and I wish him all the best.

Meanwhile, it seems like STS-133 (which I originally thought was going to launch sometime this week) is actually launching now on Feb 24th. I’ll have another post about STS-133 then. Man, guys, I can’t tell you how much I wish I could go down to Florida and watch the launch in person.

Christ. Isn’t that beautiful? That’s God damn beautiful. And incredible, too – we’ve already had 132 manned space shuttle flights. That’s remarkable.

If you’ll excuse me, I have to go cry into my star maps now.

Here’s info on the STS-133 launch:

Mission: STS-133
Space Shuttle: Discovery
Primary Payload: Permanent Multipurpose Module (PMM)
Launch Date: Targeted for Feb. 24
Launch Time: 4:50 p.m. EST
Launch Pad: 39A
Landing Site: Kennedy Space Center, Fla.
Mission Duration: 11 days
Inclination/Altitude: 51.6 degrees/122 nautical miles

And the STS-134 launch:

Launch Target: April 19, 2011

Orbiter: Endeavour

Mission Number: STS-134 (134th space shuttle flight)

Launch Window: 10 minutes

Launch Pad: 39A

Mission Duration: 14 days

Spacewalks: 4

Landing Site: KSC

Inclination/Altitude: 51.6 degrees/122 nautical miles

Primary Payload: 36th station flight (ULF6), EXPRESS Logistics Carrier 3 (ELC3), Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS)

]]> http://basementstories.org/2011/02/space-saturday-sts-133-and-134/feed/ 2 http://basementstories.org/2011/02/call-for-narrators/ http://basementstories.org/2011/02/call-for-narrators/#comments Sat, 05 Feb 2011 15:00:59 +0000 carolkirkman http://basementstories.wordpress.com/?p=179 We’re looking to podcast some stories from our next couple of issues in the immediate future. I’ve always been a fan of podcasts, as has James, and we’ve wanted to make some for a long time. We’ve finally worked up the nerve to put a few together but have hit a definite snag.

You know how they say some people have a face made for radio? Well, we both definitely have voices fit for print. Er, if that makes sense.

I’m looking for a couple of people (male and female) to narrate a few stories and poems from past and future issues of Basement Stories. Experience with this sort of thing isn’t necessary, though it would be great. I’m just looking for somebody with a good reading voice, who would be willing and able to record audio for us.

If you’d like to help us out, please email me at caroljkirkman@gmail.com. If you’ve got any audio samples of you reading that you could attach to the email, that would be immensely helpful.

For me, these are those stories.

A quick caveat: this is in no way intended to be a definitive list of the best short stories, just some of my personal favorites, and the ones that have been the most important to me.)

1. The Cold Equations by Tom Godwin

What’s it About?

A girl hitchhikes on a spaceship, not realizing that, because the fuel for each journey is precisely calculated, she won’t be allowed to reach her destination.

Why is it Important (to you)?

This is a sort of infamous story within the SF community, but when I read it I was eleven, twelve at the most. I was one of those supremely nerdy people who actually read their English textbooks, and occasionally I took mine home to read the different short stories in it. One of the short stories was “The Cold Equations”  It was one of my first clear experiences with Hard SF,  and the ending stuck with me for a long time, for years after I’d forgotten the title or author of the story. I stumbled across it in a “best of” anthology years and years after I’d first read it.  May have permanently molded my mind into liking science fiction stories with horribly depressing endings.

Where Can I Read It?

You can find it, online, here. If you’d rather read it in print, it’s in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, vol. 1, which is a great anthology all around.

2. There Will Come Soft Rains by Ray Bradbury

What’s it About?

Another classic of SF that I didn’t know was a classic when I read it. An automated house goes through its daily routine after its human inhabitants have already been killed in a nuclear explosion.

Why is it Important (to you)?

I think everyone who’s read it remembers this story. It’s a pretty poignant argument against nuclear war, written in a time where nuclear disaster seemed imminent. But, for me, it was another example of how powerful a story can be by just implying disaster. This and “The Cold Equations” made me want to read more short stories, and probably made me the insane short story consuming machine I am today.

Where Can I read it?

It’s included in Ray Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles. If you haven’t read The Martian Chronicles yet, go find a copy and read it. We’ll wait.

3. Impossible Dreams by Tim Pratt

What’s it About?

A movie buff finds a video store he’s never seen before, that leads to a different universe.

Why is it Important (to you)?

I watched Citizen Kane and The Magnificent Ambersons because of this story. I don’t want to over exaggerate and say that it changed the way I think about movies, but it certainly gave me more of an appreciation for the medium, for the malleability of the finished product based on an impossibly large amount of variables, for its ability to connect people across all sorts of lines. It’s still one of my favorites to listen to, and, to me, it’s a clear example of how to do Alternate Universes, and quiet science fiction, correctly.

Where Can I Read It?

The Escape Pod episode is free to listen to.

4. Magic for Beginners by Kelly Link

What’s it About?

A young boy watches a cult tv show with his friends while trying to cope with his parents’ impending divorce, while all the time receiving phone calls from

Why is it Important (to you)?

This is my favorite of Kelly Link’s stories, and it’s just so brilliant, on a meta-textual level. She starts out the story by saying that our protagonist is a character on the television show The Library, but by the time you’re two pages in, you’ve already forgotten that. For anyone who’s ever been torn away from people they love, or who’s ever been fannishly obsessed with a tv show, or who’s ever wished they could live in one of the worlds they’ve read about, this story makes a lot of sense. It’s so hard for me to describe why I love this story so much, but it’s clever without reminding us how clever it is, heartfelt without being sappy, and mysterious without being unreadably enigmatic. It erases the boundaries between fiction and reality until the distinction is meaningless.

Where Can I Read It?

In Kelly Link’s short story collection Magic for Beginners or her other short story collection Pretty Monsters.

5. All You Zombies by Robert Heinlein

What’s it About?

A bartender listens to a pulp writer’s life story late one night. And well, the rest? I’ll let you read for yourself.

Why is it Important (to me)?

As has already been established by this point, I like any story that can send chills up my spine or make me think I should call my mother and tell her I love her.  After I finished reading this story, late one night in college, I just stared at the ceiling for a long moment.It was one of those moments where you’re simultaneously thinking, “that was brilliant” and “I will never be that good” and “what the hell did I just read?” all at the same time.  I don’t usually like Heinlein much, but he’s a masterful storyteller, and he deftly pulls off something that most people would’ve botched.

Where Can I Read It?

Another Escape Pod episode! Thanks, Steve.

6. The House of the Seven Librarians by Ellen Klages

What’s it About?

A little girl is raised by librarians.

Why is it Important (to You?)

I have no real justification for this one. It’s not a particularly famous story, or an award-winning one. I just love it so much. I mean, come on! It’s a story about a little girl being raised by librarians, in an abandoned library. That’s beautiful. That’s just awesome. There’s something very, very comforting about this story, and I still read it when I’m in a bad mood. It’s a story you never really want to end.

Where Can I Read It?

Ellen Klages’s short story collection Portable Childhoods

What you can gather from this list, I guess, is that I’m not very original in my favorites. But I blame the fact that my house had tons of old fiction anthologies lying around that had all these dusty old Golden Age stories in them.

Our Kickstarter page is here. (For some reason we can’t get the widget to embed at the moment.)

For those of you who don’t know how Kickstarter works, it’s a great website that works to fund projects from all sorts of artists. People can pledge a certain amount of money, and writers or editors or artists will have different gifts or rewards they’ll give to backers who give them a certain amount of money.  No actual money actually goes anywhere unless the project reaches their fundraising goal (for us, it’s $100).

If you pledge money to help out our fourth issue, you can get things like Basement Stories bookmarks,  ebook versions of our fourth issue, and cookies. Yes, cookies. If you help us out, you have the opportunity to receive delicious baked goods.  How could you pass that up?

But seriously, we’d really appreciate any money we could get to help us pay our authors for #4.  If you donate, or if you pass the word around, or even just if you’ve read the magazine, thank you thank you thank you. You’re all wonderful human beings.